tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6666226609376223220.post2912363044818423762..comments2012-10-14T06:36:43.136-04:00Comments on 5B4: Two Books on Jeff Wall from MoMAMr. Whisketsnoreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6666226609376223220.post-9141556243614230602008-01-19T19:30:00.000-05:002008-01-19T19:30:00.000-05:00Take a look at Eggleston's images and you will ver...Take a look at Eggleston's images and you will very often see the toes also cut off. (See "Guide") I think that is where Jeff Wall's "toe cutting" motivations exist.dRhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16403059341690593618noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6666226609376223220.post-39584071922336776892007-07-29T13:11:00.000-04:002007-07-29T13:11:00.000-04:00While I think my taste for Jeff Wall, both his wor...While I think my taste for Jeff Wall, both his work & his writings, may differ from yours, you bring up some really important points about photography, photographic culture & museum culture which we all face. First is the institutionalization of photography in a museum culture, which basically applies a technical, academic language to work, which is really for the benefit of museum and gallery professionals, in terms of both classifying and also selling photography as art. While I think a critical language is important, you have also touched on an aspect to this language that it can also be used as a form of class difference, a tool for an elite. & it is not necessarily any more informed or sharper in thought. & also the paradox of someone like Wall, like a lot of artists defining themselves as "critical", is that their work still functions as a luxury item in the gallery system & also carries with it a high overhead in terms of its production, not just in its retail value. Wall is coming out of an earlier use of photography by conceptual artists in which the banality & cheapness of photography was utilized as an artistic strategy - are we in a such a period of late capitalism that that no longer means anything? Wall's early pieces like "Mimic" & "Diatribe" have very cogent political sensibilities - however, for whom? The institutionalization of photography also seems to neuter it in terms of its effect - I guess it's reality-effect. On the museum/gallery wall it becomes aesthetics as opposed to it's earlier "modernity" (I am thinking of it in the 1920s - 1930s) wherein as a medium outside fine arts it had positive effects in reportage, documentation, even advertising. But at this point I am getting far away from the immediate discussion at hand, Jeff Wall - thanks for putting up w/ my ravings -One Way Streethttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11821529041615599849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6666226609376223220.post-89446740129167311552007-07-20T12:53:00.000-04:002007-07-20T12:53:00.000-04:00Help! I didn't go to grad school....read this post...Help! I didn't go to grad school....read this post...and now I can't get up!hipshooternoreply@blogger.com